Despite still battling the COVID-19 chronicles, South Africa has another wave to brace – one linked to our collective tiny nemesis – the mosquito.
A Malaria alert has been issued by the National Institute of Communicable Diseases (NICD) affecting a few parts of the country. Malaria season is in full swing with many regions placed on alert.
In fortunate news for the Western Cape, we are not one of these areas – however, just because certain regions are not hotspots, does not excuse them from potential concern in light of ‘Odyssean’ or ‘taxi malaria’ transported by hitch-hiking mosquitos.
Here are the impacted areas:
- Limpopo
- KwaZulu-Natal
- Mpumalanga
A warning has also been issued for returning travellers from Mozambique.
Misdiagnosis concerns
“Despite South Africa entering its peak malaria season, many cases are being misdiagnosed as COVID-19. Both have similar non-specific early symptoms including fever, chills, headaches, fatigue and muscle pain. Undiagnosed and untreated cases rapidly progresses to severe illness, with a potentially fatal outcome.
“Any individual presenting with fever or ‘flu-like’ illness, if they reside in a malaria-risk area in Limpopo, KwaZulu-Natal and Mpumalanga or have travelled to a malaria-risk area, especially Mozambique, in the past six weeks, must be tested for malaria by blood smear microscopy or malaria rapid diagnostic test. If they test positive for malaria, the patient must be started on malaria treatment, immediately”, said the NICD in a statement.
Don’t brush it off simply because you aren’t in a hotspot area:
“Odyssean or ‘taxi malaria’, transmitted by hitch-hiking mosquitoes, should be considered in a patient with unexplained fever who has not travelled to an endemic area, but is getting progressively sicker, with a low platelet count,” the NICD noted.
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